Effective molecular diagnostic analysis and life science studies depend on effectively prepared samples—such as nucleic acids—for analysis. The majority of techniques utilized for sample preparation, however, entail laborious and time consuming processes to ensure reproducible and high-purity samples. Additionally, these techniques require technician hands-on time which is expensive and increases the chance of human error during the preparation.
Sample preparation represents the bottleneck to the majority of molecular diagnostic applications today in the life sciences fields and is cited as the most important factor in high quality gene expression studies. While the majority of development in the field of molecular diagnostics is devoted to improved methods for the detection and identification of disease related target analytes, less focus is devoted to the preparation of samples for these systems.
Sample preparation also represents a complex set of activities in the laboratory, including sample collection, lysis, separation of the biological macromolecules from a complex contaminant rich environment, purification of these separated macromolecules from remaining contaminants, and elution of the sample in solutions that are compatible with downstream analysis processes. While several automated sample preparation platforms exist, the majority of these systems require multiple bench top steps in addition to the automated functions of the process. With the increasing emphasis on high-throughput molecular diagnostics testing in the clinical environment, fast, reproducible methods and systems for sample preparation are required. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for devices and methods that perform rapid, reproducible sample preparations.